


Various Class/Aspect Models

by FunkMcLovin



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Analysis, Aspects, Classpects (Homestuck), FUCK, aspect homestuck, aspect model, class homestuck, classpect analysis, homestuck analysis, homestuck nonfiction, hussian analysis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:00:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27528052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FunkMcLovin/pseuds/FunkMcLovin
Summary: Hello, my name is Jojo. I think about Classpects a lot, and in this series I'll be posting about them a whole hell of a lot. (mario voice) here we gooooo!
Comments: 5
Kudos: 9





	1. Model 1: Aspect Extensions

EDIT Nov 13: Fixed a graphic link.

What's the scoop, snoop?

For the classpect spelunkers in the audience, I'm sure you're familiar with aspects and their opposites, the most canon framework for interpreting aspects in Homestuck. For the uninitiated, the twelve aspects in Homestuck are all arranged in a circle, with the aspect across from theirs forming an aspect pair. The wheel, available as part of the Extended Zodiac, looks like THIS:

As you can see, breath is opposite to blood, hope to rage, time to space, etc etc. Each aspect on the wheel has an "inverse." This has a great many implications in classpect analysis and adds a framework to one of the less explored lore tidbits in the comic. If you LIKE this framework of opposites, then all power to you, I think it has merits, as well, but this essay and the model espoused herein does away with it wholesale. If you'd like more info on aspects and their opposites, check out the likes of OptimisticDuelist or 0pacifica, they have devoted a lot of time to analysis in a more conventional manner.

So, that raises the question, "Jojo, if you hate classpect opposites, why? And more vitally, what replaces that framework?"

Well, gentle reader, a great many things. I'm hard at work unlocking the puzzle that is aspects, busy aligning them all in unconventional ways and refusing to come to terms with the fact that they're not actually that deep and probably were just included as an afterthought by an author who already had too many balls in the air. That's not to say they're bad- After all, who doesn't like balls?

**My main issue with aspects on this system is that the "opposites" are inconsistent.**

For example. Aspects like Time and Space as well as Heart and Mind seem to compliment each other, both forming one part of a greater whole. This is in opposition to aspects like Rage and Hope or Void and Light, which are instead opposites. There are more ambiguous relations, too, like Breath and Blood. Are they opposites? Are they compliments? This relationship is pretty tenuous at best, and two aspects' positions opposite each other on the wheel seem only to imply "a relationship," which is so arbitrary as to be useless.

Some creative bending of the aspects' definitions can be invented to explain this away, like setting complimentary aspects in opposition or setting opposing aspects as some sort of compliment, but this requires the changing of the aspects themselves where I think it's far more useful to change the framework.

**The framework I have in mind is a bit more complicated.**

**Behold!**

****

Holy hell what is ANY of this?

Well this yellow-arrow abomination is a different system I concocted with the help of my diligent aspect-spelunker BUCKO. This spaghetti feast warrants explanation, so I'll offer it presently.

**Each 12 aspects forms 4 groups of 3.**

Each four groups represents a theme, and each aspect inside of the theme has a cyclical relationship with its peers- Like 4 simultaneous games of scissors-paper-rock.

The four themes and their constituents:

_time-light-hope (THE TEMPORAL)_

_life-breath-space (THE SPATIAL)_

_heart-mind-blood (THE MENTAL)_

_rage-void-doom (THE INEVITABLE)_

Let's examine one specific theme to see what I mean. Let's discuss the final theme, THE INEVITABLE.

Starting with Rage, we lead into Void, then into Doom, then back into Rage, in a cycle. (Refer to those 3 on the graph.) The idea is that Rage, if it becomes potent enough, will lead to Void, and void, if potent enough, leads to Doom, which, potent enough, becomes Rage, et cetera.

Rage and anger's destruction leads to Void's nothingness, and that nothingness spells Doom for all. That doom then fosters more Rage. A cycle of anguish. Like Yoda said- Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate... You get the idea.

The three other themes can be explained similarly:

 _THE TEMPORAL:_ The flow of Time manifests Light's fortune, giving people Hope, allowing them more Time to work.

 _THE SPATIAL_ : Life and lives beget the Breath of stories, which lead to Space's perpetuation, which leads to more Life.

 _THE MENTAL_ : Feelings in one's Heart become the thoughts of the Mind which invigorate their Blood, which churns in the Heart.

 **Outside of conceptually, this is easy to see in-comic, too,** with the goals and actions of the various players. Each player of a certain aspect has a goal or undergoes an action related to the next aspect in the chain.

Fig 1: _Breath_ June repairing the timeline, using her new powers to fix physical errors _Spatially_.

Fig 2: _Space_ player Kanaya hoping to secure a mother grub egg to make new _Life_.

Fig 3: _Rage_ player Gamzee facilitating the _Void_ of nonexistence with LE through his actions raising the Cal-siblings.

Fig 4: _Light_ player Rose delivering the tumor to give _Hope_ to her friends. _Time_ player Dave is also there, helping his _Lightbound_ sibling as well as doing it for the _fortune_ of his friends.

Fig 5: _Light_ player Vriska trying to give her group _hope_ (though her efforts ARE misguided,) through her plights like taking on Bec Noir.

Fig 6: _Hope_ player Jake's abilities buying Aranea _Time_ to execute her plan in the Game Over timeline.

Fig 7: _Mind_ player Terezi's final act being a note in _Blood_ to June to fix the timeline.

Fig 8: _Heart_ player Dirk fragmenting his own _Mind_ into a machine version of himself.

Fig 9: _Life_ player Jane taking over the _Breath_ of the narrative in some capacity in Act 6.

Fig 10: _Void_ player Roxy facilitating her planet's _Doom_ by her decision to play Sburb, a decision she struggles with for some time.

Fig 11: _Doom_ player Sollux being prone to bouts of _Rage._

Fig 12: _Blood_ player Karkat being the _Heart_ of his Sburb team.

Fig 13: _Space_ players harboring the forge, the necessary sburb construct needed to create the new universe's _life._

Fig 14: _Life_ player Meenah struggling for relevance ( _Breath_ ) after her own death.

Fig 15: _Light_ the aspect being related to fortune, which requires _Time_ to be relevant. Especially Rose, who sees the future.

Fig 16: Jake's _Hope_ powers manifest as being made of _Light_ and are drawn out by a Light player.

Need I go on? I probably could. I might, but later. I think I've demonstrated my point enough. **Basically, heroes of an aspect draw from powers further back on the chain to further goals that relate to later in the chain.**

The big question now is, what can we do with this? Well, that's a good question. I see aspect analysis being useful in two ways. One, to layer on top of non-homestuck media to draw conclusions about it, a la "Will it Homestuck," or we can layer it on top of Homestuck itself to draw conclusions about things more explicitly. I've already done the latter with my various figments, so I'd love to see analysis of other media using this framework.

At the end of the day, this is just one theory, a theory that I think is a little more easy to apply and a little more malleable than a strict "aspect opposites" system. More useful conclusions can be drawn and more things fit into this framework than with the aspect wheel as it stands. 

**I can imagine some criticisms of this system,** namely that some of the associations I draw are just as arbitrary as the classic "opposite" system. For example, space leading to life is explicit in the narrative of Homestuck, but Time leading into Light needs more of an explanation, requiring outside speculation. I can also imagine there are some people who are so mired in the classic analysis that they don't like the idea of throwing it out. After all, the aspect wheel was made canon with the EZod, I imagine some people are thinking, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." To be clear, I'm not trying to tear down classic analysis, OD and 0pacifica and everyone else who's contributed to aspect theory is still just as great at the end of the day. This is a fictional analytical framework, they can and should co-exist. As a matter of fact, the classic aspect wheel and this system aren't even mutually exclusive! Aspects can have more than one relationship.

I think that this model could be built upon and I could see myself expanding upon it if enough people pitch in their thoughts **(please comment below!)**

 **Some questions for readers:** What relationships could be improved? What are some other examples of this framework functioning in-canon? How do the four themes interact with the others? How could this co-exist with the established aspect wheel? How could this framework be improved? What's good about this framework? What's bad about it?

The platonic ideal for any framework is one that is both flexible and canon-compliant, and this gets closer than the aspect wheel, but it's still not quite there yet. That's why this is just model #1. **I'll be posting more later on, so stay tuned!**


	2. Model 1: Response, Dialectic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Responding to some comments on Model #1 or the extension theory.

> Life --> Time --> Doom  
> For a potential trio using this idea. (The specific connection is definitely up for debate I changed it like 3 times already) Time aspects use their powers to circumvent Doom which lets the other players continue with a safer Life, and through the passage of Time every Life ends in Doom.

Posted by Winnieanne.

I like this a lot- This would work really well with a small tweak: Instead of Life > Time > Doom > Life, etc, like in the model, these three could work more like Life > Time > Doom > Time > Life > [...]

In other words, instead of cyclical, these three could go back and forth between Life and Doom with Time as an intermediary.

Thanks!

> thinking some thoughts not sure if they actually relate to this or if i was just inspired by it but
> 
> doom i.e. the end of all things -> void i.e. emptiness/nothing there -> space i.e. an empty, fertile ground in which something can begin -> mind i.e. ideas, thinking of what could fill that space -> hope i.e. now we have an idea we might actually be able to make it happen -> breath i.e. agency, taking action to make it happen -> life i.e. the beginning/the idea entering material reality and gaining life -> light i.e. let there be light but also once something exists it matters -> time i.e. things continue to grow and change as time passes -> heart i.e. relationships, selfhood, philosophy; packbonding -> rage i.e. religion, conflict; larger structured society -> blood i.e. tribalism, war, bloodshed -> doom i.e. death and the end
> 
> some of these are a bit weak, could use more thought imo but that’s the gist of it?
> 
> all your arrows point in the same direction which is what inspired this but like halfway through i realized i was going clockwise and your arrows all point counterclockwise so uh. anyway thoughts?

Posted by milesss.

I get it, so it's like one big cycle instead of a chain of smaller ones. Like you said, some of these are a little forced, but some of these work out very well, like void leading into space and rage leading into blood. I also like hope > breath and blood > doom!

A few of these that I'm not so hot on are time > heart and space > mind. With a fairly small amount of rearranging, this could be perfect. I think that a wheel like this also bends the definitions of some aspects as well, or that some of the flows are backwards, like life > breath could more likely be breath > life, etc.

Kudos to you though for fitting the existing wheel into a workable chain! I could feel my brain opening up when I read your comment. I like some of the associations you draw with certain aspects, like rage being tied to religion, which is something obvious that I never picked up on. After all, both Makaras are heavily involved in religion. I also always interpreted Life to be more literal, IE "a consciousness," but you draw parallels to "beginnings" more than biological life, I like that. I'm a firm believer that every aspect has a LITERAL interpretation, IE Life as "Life" and Time as "the passage of time" but also a FIGURATIVE interpretation, IE Space as "a vacuum, potential to be filled," or Blood as "bonds and friendship," and your comment adds to that notion.

I think the biggest advantage your chain has over my chain is that it uses the established wheel and doesn't establish anything new. It's more Occam's Razor compliant, it opens up less room for questions. Here's my take on it, but backwards:

Starting with LIFE:

Life, and the people who constitute it, make stories in the form of > Breath, which inspires people, giving them > Hope, which invigorates and gives them ideas in their > Minds, which leads to creation in > Space. But if too much space is used, it leads to a > Void, which spells > Doom for everyone. Doom and strife lead to > Blood, and bloodshed leads to > Rage. This rage, in lieu of hope, inspires people's > Hearts, instead of their minds. With this new empathy and the passage of > Time, people are able to rebuild and regain their > Light- Their fortune. This light leads then into new, invigorated > Life once again.

You could potentially do this with any chain that makes sense! You could even take the SAME chain and figure out a different impetus for them. It's rather fun.

I think you also touch on something in your analysis, and that's the fact that some aspects have overlapping ideas. For instance, your definitions of Hope and Breath are close, IE they're both about "making things happen," or how you mention both "heart" and "blood" are about bonds. These overlaps are actually the basis for ANOTHER form of analysis I'll hit on later.

**[AUTHOR'S NOTE: As more people comment on Chapter 1, I'll post more of my thoughts HERE. Thank you to everyone who commented.]**


	3. Model 2: Aspect Overlap Spectrums

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second model. Aspects that overlap and ways to analyze them that way.

So last time, we talked about different ways Aspects can relate other than by "opposites," as defined by the aspect wheel.

I won't re-tread that ground except to say that I think this model is limiting and also self-contradictory. For example, Space and Time are COMPLIMENTS, whereas Light and Void are OPPOSITES, yet both are across from each other on the wheel.

I think a better way to express all this is to make a model that doesn't imply any qualitative relationship at all- Instead we can discuss Aspects in "groups" that deal with similar concepts. I touched upon this in "Model 1: Aspect Extensions" in the 4 groups of inter-related aspects. This model has less to do with "groups" as a formal concept, but more in terms of "group" as a verb.

**FOR INSTANCE.**

Let's take a concept, say... "The Passage of Time," and "group" aspects that are related to that concept.

The furthest left is Void, since the void is an "absence" of things, so the passage of time has nothing to do with it. Moving right, we have Blood, which is more about existing bonds, so it has little to do with it. Similarly are Mind, Heart, and Rage, which all have to do with existing feelings. Next is Hope, which can affect the future, but has more to do with staunchly-held beliefs. Neutral is Life, since life is about established life but also to potential for more. Then Space, which is the only way time can be noticeably moved, then Breath, which is the telling of stories- Beginnings, middles, ends, etc, then Doom and Light, which have to do with potential future outcomes, then of course, furthest right is Time itself.

This is something of a case study, but you can do this with each of the 12 aspects. Basically, taking the "essentials" of an aspect like I've done, boil it down to a "concept" like "The Passage of Time," then relate the OTHER aspects to it on this same spectrum.

The beauty of THIS, however, is that if someone disagrees with my notion of "Time" as meaning "The Passage of Time" they can take this model and make a new spectrum accordingly. Like, for instance, if someone thought Time meant "Execution and Perpetuation of the Alpha Timeline," they could make a spectrum based on THAT.

You get the idea- Furthest left is Doom, since it is the antithesis of a functional timeline. Next, Rage and Heart, which have little to do with a healthy timeline. Then Blood, then Void and Space, which are vectors that can be exploited. Then Mind, because usually intelligence is necessary for a healthy timeline, then Life, which is required for people to make choices that affect the timeline to begin with. Then Hope, which has to do with the needs of the timeline and the people trying to execute it. Then finally, breath and light, which have to do with stories and luck necessary to access the Alpha timeline, then finally, Time itself.

You get the idea. I'll include a blank edition in case you'd like to make your own!

 **Some questions for readers:** What are the pros and cons of this model? What are some other "groups" one could make? Which aspects are more likely to be grouped together more often? Which are less likely? How could this system be improved?

Admittedly, I've put less thought into this one because it's less a "model" and more like a "framework," since there's no concrete place that aspects fall. I like systems that are incredibly flexible like this, because aspects are so tough to pin down.

Here's a BLANK one:


End file.
